|
|
|
|
 ↑ Grab this Headline Animator
|
|
THEATRE
Endgame
Venue: Intimate Theatre, Orange St, Cape Town. Tel: 083 292
6194.
Time: -
Price: R60 - R100
Performances: 3 (preview), 4, 10, 12, 14, 15 (@
15h00), 18, 20, 21 (@ 15h00), 24, 26, 28 at 20h00 & 29 (@ 15h00) Aug 2010
Genre: Drama
|
|
The Mechanicals
breathe life into Endgame, Samuel Beckett’s timeless, classic theatrical
Masterpiece.
Beckett is one of the most
celebrated and influential dramatists of the twentieth century. His 1953
play Waiting for Godot with its incongruent plot and seemingly pointless
dialogue, helped advance the concept of a “Theatre of the Absurd” and is
regarded as a masterpiece. Beckett's plays utilize non-standard and
minimalist staging techniques and experimental language and character
development. Beckett continually strove to remove the physicality of the
dramatic experience, e.g. elaborate staging, intricate sets, etc., in an
attempt to illustrate the inner turmoil of humanity, and to force the
audience to reach a higher level of understanding without relying on the
traditional forms of theatre. Beckett's innovative style and stark
exploration into the human condition were considered ground-breaking and
his influence is apparent throughout contemporary theatre right around the
world.
|
article continues below
|
|
|
In Endgame, Beckett again focused on two characters,
bedraggled survivors of an apparent holocaust. The two men, Hamm (Guy De
Lancey) and Clov (Adrian Collins), are faced with the nothingness of their
existence as they attempt to validate their lives, eventually falling back
on memories to justify their existence.
Beckett uses chess as the play's controlling metaphor, and
he explores the human dilemma, mortality, and God's existence, without
providing simple answers, as his characters, and the audience, move
through an uncertain existence. The game of chess becomes the metaphor
that gives a seemingly structureless play a dramatic scheme. The
characters in Endgame are chess pieces.
The metaphorical king of Endgame is the centre of attention,
and the rules of chess apply to the characters, their setting, and their
situation. The protagonist of the play is Hamm, an aged master who is
blind and not able to stand up, and his servant Clov, who cannot sit down.
They exist in a grimy and seemingly post-apocalyptic bunker. The two
characters, mutually dependent, have been fighting for years and continue
to do so as the play progresses. Clov always wants to leave but never
seems to be able. Also present are Hamm's legless parents Nagg (Nicholas
Ellenbogen) and Nell (Liz Szymczak), who live in rubbish bins, request
food or argue inanely.
|
|
|
